VERESH PETER

Member of the National Union of Artists of Ukraine (1995).

He was born on 5 March 1943 in Popovo village (an old name Csonkapapi), Berehove district, Transcarpathian region. His love for drawing was awakened by his mother Ida Veres, who skilfully drew patterns from flowers for embroidery on the towels. At first, Peter copied his mother and then started portraying everything he saw. In 1968, he graduated from the Uzhhorod College of Applied Arts. The teachers Pavlo Balla, Attila Dunchak, Edita Medvetska-Lutak and Sandor Petki had the greatest influence on the young man. A young artist often went outside the city with an easel behind his shoulders to admire the beautiful sceneries, and then convey them to canvases. He liked painting the riders on the horseback.

He worked under the guidance of the architect Y. Homoni as a graphic artist of the projects under the Uzhhorod Fund of the Union of Artists of the USSR. He was also a ceramist at the Berehove Majolica Plant, he worked at the local studio of the Transcarpathian Production, Art and Design Complex.

"At the official work, the artist had to paint commercial advertising, political posters, various scenery," Vari Fabian, a member of the Hungarian Academy of Arts, told about Veres. And only in rare free minutes, it was possible to reproduce the spiritual world, the vision of surrounding."

The artist was fond of the Hungarian national history. In 1976, to the 300th anniversary of the birth of Ferenc Rakoczy, P. Veres created a series of paintings with charcoal. Later he made an illustration with ink to the poem "The Legend of Super Deer" by Janos Arany. In his works, there are those devoted to the revolution of 1848 – 1849. However, when he proposed his unusual improvements to the regional exhibition, the jury rejected them – they did not fit into the framework of socialist realism. In general, the artist could not openly oppose the then Communist regime. But he veiledly made us understand: this regime cannot exist forever because it brings evil, violence, oppression. These motives can be seen in "Angels Who Are Watching", "Killed Innocent Babies", "Hunter", and others.

The artist spent a significant part of the 80s painting a series of watercolours on the history of Berehove, which was preceded by a long study of archives. Now this series decorates the walls of the Berehove school No. 6. A significant source of inspiration for his painting was folk art. In the second half of the 80s, the artist created a decorative series of panels called "Folk Costumes", as well as the canvas "Making Jam", in which he retained the moments of primary, abstract figures and in an interesting context gave us almost forgotten customs. Graphics from the series "Ballad of the Dragon" is a kind of perpetuation of the grotesque dragon figure, torn from prehistoric times, which breaks into the lives of helpless and beaten by fate people.

Péter Veres was one of the first to teach a course in art history at the Transcarpathian Hungarian Institute. He became one of the founders of the Society of Hungarian Artists of Fine and Applied Arts of Transcarpathia named after I. Revesz.

The artist's work was noted by the numerous Hungarian awards, including the prize of Art Foundation named after Attila Jozsef (in 2002). Participant in numerous all-Ukrainian and regional exhibitions. Personal exhibitions took place in Berehove (1988, 1997), Uzhhorod (1990, 1996 – 1997, 1999), and Budapest (1991).